


Chameleon

by Sera_Clay



Category: The Blacklist (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-15
Updated: 2015-03-28
Packaged: 2018-03-18 01:37:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 10,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3551204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sera_Clay/pseuds/Sera_Clay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lizzington, adventure, angst, romance. Not my characters, no financial reward involved.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Abandon All Hope

It's ironic that it's Ressler who finally convinces her to abandon all hope.

She's heard so much from so many people over the course of the last month. Their warnings have slowly combined with the words she's heard over and over, for as long as she's known Raymond Reddington.

"He's not who you think he is."

In the past, Liz spent so much time trying to figure out the riddles of her past. Her connection to Reddington. His connection to Sam.

But now she understands what those words really mean. What everyone was trying to tell her. Red is a chameleon. A reflexive, compulsive, pathological chameleon.

For her to imagine she knows him is more than enough to trigger a shift. A change.

A month ago she lay naked in his arms, as they whispered words of passion to each other throughout the night.

The next morning he was gone.

Two days later the task force was disbanded.

"Reddington's had his immunity deal transferred to the CIA."

Harold Cooper sounded weary when he made the announcement, but there was a spring in his step as he left the Post Office for the last time. He retired immediately, left Ressler in charge of decommissioning the black site, debriefing what remained of their team.

Aram is angry, and refuses to speak to her.

Mossad orders Samar back home.

Ressler summons her to Cooper's old office, sits her down, holds out his hand for her badge. Turns it over in his fingers.

He's clearly an amateur magician, not up to her standard. Liz could distract him, flip that badge across the room without him even noticing.

"You know, Keen, he told Cooper why he left. And Cooper told me."

What?

Liz is abruptly paying complete attention. He could not possibly have told them. Red would never be so cruel. Not even to her.

"He said he felt you were coming to rely on him. Not developing as an agent. That he respected you too much to continue."

Liz holds Ressler's gaze without blinking.

"That's crap and you know it."

Ressler shrugs.

"This is a real slap in the face for the agency," he responds. "Sinks our careers, ends yours."

Liz nods numbly. She knew it before he asked for her badge. A clueless technician has already collected her weapon and handcuffs.

"With your permission, then, I'm going home to Nebraska. I'll leave an address for my paperwork."

Ressler nods.

"And Keen?"

"Yes?" 

She looks at him from where she stands in the doorway, poised to leave.

"He's not capable of love. Don't kid yourself."

She shrugs, allows just a fraction of what she's feeling to bleed into her voice. Since it's so clearly showing on her face.

"Are any of us?"


	2. Nebraska

Spring time in Nebraska. Cold and blustery.

Liz rents an office in Papillion and opens a private counseling practice. She volunteers at the animal shelter and as a Big Sister on weekends, fills her evenings with exercise classes.

She donates to every local charity that requests funding, expands her practice.

It's a fulfilling, solid, responsible life.

She's bored out of her mind.

She switches from exercise classes to martial arts, spends more time at the shooting range. Hires more staff. Expands her office again.

Why did she move back here anyway?

On the one year anniversary of opening her counseling practice, she sends her employees home early and pulls a manila envelope from the locked bottom drawer of her desk. 

The envelope she only allows herself to open once a week.

It's a pathetic, tawdry collection.

Red's handkerchief, stained with his blood, her tears. Copies of his Most Wanted flyers, surely a foolish memento. And the one, treasured photo she managed to snap of him and Dembe, laughing at each other in the bright Miami sunshine, the day Red took them sailing.

Liz stares down sadly at their faces.

Dembe. Red is not wholly chameleon. He never abandons Dembe.

Liz never wants to see Raymond Reddington again. But something about Dembe's warm, open smile stirs her frozen heart.

Yes. She does want to see Dembe again.

***

It's more complicated than she expected to locate Dembe without risking any attention from Red.

All the phone numbers she has are long obsolete, and she's not interested in drawing the notice of the CIA.

Attractive, yet treacherous.

That's how she feels about them as well. 

Liz doesn't want to know anything about Reddington's new allies at the CIA. The thought of meeting whatever new woman he's made the current target of his attentions disgusts and frightens her.

She's been more than willing to kill for him. That attitude is enough to put her at risk, even after a year apart. Her reactions are still heightened, not those of a peaceful civilian.

She can't stop thinking about him. Even after all this time.

Not just because their one night was the best sex of her life.

But because Liz let herself love him, abandoned all her defenses in his arms, and babbled promises that still scald her face when she remembers them.

He tried to stop her, she remembers that now. Tried to hush her, kiss her into submission. Make that night about their bodies and nothing more.

Would he still be with her, if all she had wanted was the surge of desire, then the comfort and heat of his big body curled around her in sleep?

She can't believe that. Not after everything they went through together.

Liz tucks the envelope away, locks the drawer.

She's going to take a little holiday.


	3. New Orleans

Mardi Gras would be the worst time to try and locate Dembe in New Orleans, except that Liz knows the name of his cousin's Krewe. And it looks perfectly natural for her to dress in costume.

Liz thinks she does show girl pretty well, her blond wig falling to her waist, her thigh high white vinyl boots matching her mini-skirt and minuscule bra top.

She's wearing long fake eyelashes and her neck is loaded with multicolor beads obtained by the simple expedient of flipping that top down below the crowded bar balconies on a few major streets in the Quarter.

Liz spots Dembe, waves at him and shrieks his name in as high a tone as she can manage.

He turns and stares at her for a moment without recognition.

She swaggers toward him, swinging her white vinyl-clad hips. Watches his expression turn from cautious, to interested, to appalled.

As she approaches him, Dembe grabs her bare upper arms and gives her a shake, then crushes her to him in a hug.

"Are you crazy? What are you doing here, Elizabeth?" Dembe whispers in her ear as he holds her tightly against his tall frame.

He sounds furious, ferocious. He smells like rum, and sweat, and Cuban cigars.

Oh god. Oh god.

She clings to him hard. All the times he saved her, saved Red, start running randomly through her mind like tiny flashes of memory.

The essential decency of the man, above all else.

Liz draws back, meets his concerned dark eyes.

"I've been so lonely."

His face softens, his big hand reaches to brush a strand of long, fake blond hair away from her face.

She didn't mean to say that. It's not his problem to solve, what she should do with the rest of her life.

"Have you been well?" she asks him. She's not here to ask about Red. Whatever he can tell her, she's pretty sure she can't bear to know.

Dembe shrugs. Rolls his eyes.

They stare at each other for a moment.

Dembe was there that night. He stood guard at their hotel door. He gravely watched Liz leave with that stupid, blissful smile on her face. That was the last time she saw him.

"May I give you a drink?" he offers at last.

She smiles. "Of course."

He gestures at a slim woman in a mermaid costume, her tail waving provocatively to one side of the slip up the center of her skirt, revealing and concealing her long legs with each movement.

"Do you have the rum?" he calls out.

In answer, she raises a large, unlabeled plastic bottle filled with a golden brown liquid. Tosses it to Dembe, who catches it easily, unscrews the lid and presents it to Liz with a broad smile.

"Drink, and then, we will talk."

***

Sitting on wooden crates, knees touching, several drinks in, Liz knows a great deal about Dembe's new house in Costa Rica, and the brilliant woman in Mumbai eight months ago who at the very least dented his heart, and his cousin's three bright and active young children.

He knows about her new life in Papillion, that she's no longer on speaking terms with anyone in the FBI, and that she's still alone.

The conversation slows. Liz stares down into the bottle. Enough.

"He sent me away, you know," says Dembe abruptly. No need to speak his name. It hangs in the air between them.

"Why?" asks Liz. She can't imagine Red without his silent, deadly shadow.

"I disagreed about the CIA. Didn't you?"

Liz shakes her head, hands Dembe the bottle.

"He never asked me. He just ..disappeared."

She turns both palms up, shrugs.

Dembe frowns at her.

"He never told you?"

Liz tilts her head, watches his eyes as he drinks. He looks good in green - he'll make a fabulous merman. He's probably deadly with a trident as well.

"Told me what?"

"Why he approached the CIA?"

Liz shook her head, slowly.

"I never even found out whether they requested it, or he did. Just that he accepted the change."

Dembe takes a long swig from the bottle.

"I assumed that you two were saying good-bye, that night."

She and Dembe appear to have a private language. 'That night' can only mean one thing.

Wait, Red already knew he was leaving?

After almost a year of pushing those memories away, it takes her a moment to draw them back to her alcohol-fuzzed mind.

Liz remembers hugging Dembe as she stepped out into the hotel hallway in the early morning, her high black heels dangling from one hand, her long black winter jacket from the other. 

***

She's not wearing stockings, and her short, low-cut black velvet evening frock is completely inappropriate for a Sunday morning. Even with her face scrubbed clean of make-up and her head pinned back into a tidy bun, anyone who takes one look at her will immediately know that she didn't make it home last night.

She needs to get back to her apartment, change her clothes, and think about what just happened. Not just think, but luxuriate, gloat, glory in the wonder of her first night with Red. 

He sleeps so lightly, she woke him so many times in the night. Although even half-asleep, his instincts are so perfectly tuned to her body. They finally wore each other out, and he's much older than she is. 

Red needs to sleep in and rest up, Liz thinks fondly as she pulls on her heels and coat while waiting for the elevator. She leaves a note at the bedside - just "see you tonight" with a silly little heart. No signature.

***

She left him that morning without saying good-bye.

Liz stares over at Dembe. He's sitting with his big hands folded over the open top of the bottle, as if to remind himself not to take another drink. 

She remembers how Dembe hugged her back outside the hotel room, harder than usual, then pressed a kiss to her cheek. That was new. She assumed at the time that it was some acknowledgment of her new relationship with Red.

Oh. That was Dembe, saying good-bye.


	4. Planning

On the long flight back to Nebraska, after connecting for no particular reason through Houston, Liz tries and fails to imagine what could have made Red leave the way he did.

Dembe refused to tell her. He just shook his head and said that it was not his story to tell.

He's not often stubborn, but when he is? Liz didn't bother to argue, or ask him again.

She gave Dembe her Nebraska land line and her address, and he gave her a burner phone with one number stored amid twenty innocuous contacts.

"I only hear from him at Christmas," he told her after their last drink together. "So if you talk with him before December, let me know how he's doing?"

She nodded and hugged him tight for a long moment, kissed his cheek as well this time.

"I'll see you soon," she said, and walked away without looking back, weaving slightly on her high heeled boots from the rum, Zydeco music ringing in her ears.

***

Liz needs information. She's not about to subject herself to the scrutiny, the possible humiliation, of being caught looking for Raymond Reddington more than a year after he's clearly moved on.

Not by anyone.

She returns to Papillion and complains to her staff that her Mardi Gras vacation was not really restful. That she's going camping, next time. She pencils off the month of May. Her individual clients can wait, or talk with someone else on staff.

Sharing her complaints forces Liz to recognize that she has no true friends in Papillion, only associates and colleagues and acquaintances. She tells everyone only what she thinks they need to hear.

On her next free weekend Liz drives into Lincoln and spends way too much money at a little camping store next to a cycle shop, one that stocks all the right brands. Liz rarely touches Sam's trust accounts, other than the monthly cash withdrawals they both agreed seemed reasonable. The ones she's made since she entered college.

So much untraceable cash, by now. She switches around bills from the cache and her wallet routinely, without thinking much about it. The way some women discard outdated mascara. Adds more cash whenever she can.

On the floor of the walk-in closet in her room, carefully crafted floorboards removed, Liz sits back on her heels, staring down at the worn carpet bag full of bundled stacks of bills.

Is she really considered spending any part of this careful hoard on finding Red? Figuring out what the CIA offered him that the FBI could not?

Does she really think that she can ever reconstruct why he would let her come so close, let her in for just that one night, and then leave her?

That's not profiling, that's madness.

Red always told her, from the very first day, he was a liar. That he never told her the whole truth.

Was there any truth, in that night, in his bed, any truth at all?

What is she willing to pay, to risk, to find out?

Liz looks back over her shoulder at the spacious room, invitingly decorated in complementary neutrals. The wide, soft bed where she's slept alone for more than a year now.

She can't imagine inviting anyone into her sensible, responsible life. Into that bed.

Except one man, her treacherous mind whispers. Only one man.

Whatever it costs her will be worth it to silence that persistent little voice in the back of her mind, so filled with longing, so impossibly resilient.

The trust funds are stuffed full of income, barely touched by her camping gear spree. She should have been diversifying her investments.

Liz adds money manager to her mental list, the one that includes gardening service and house sitter, and sets out to start gently disengaging from her volunteer commitments.

She writes and mails several brief, carefully worded letters. Certain things can only be entrusted to paper.

Then she waits.


	5. In Motion, Gradually

Samar's parents respond first. They have clearly sought guidance on what to say. Their letter is kind, but firm. At the very end of the letter, they include their phone number, 'in case you ever visit Israel.' Excellent.

Ressler's putative employer, a US contractor, informs her by form letter than her correspondence will be retained for one year and provided to him if at all possible. She sets that letter aside. He's still active FBI; his brother must have sent her letter to some cover PO Box.

Aram's letters are returned as not at this address. Undeliverable. She remails newly handwritten versions of the letter to another three cousins. At some point, if he's still alive, someone will forward one of them to him. She just can't appear too eager.

Liz cries when she reads the letter from Cooper's widow. It's so kind. So encouraging. So much more than she deserves. She burns it in the barbecue grill out back.

In preparation for her trip, she calls an all staff meeting in early April. With pizza and soda and a big salad for the gluten free, and brownies from the bakery up the street for dessert. She still doesn't cook. Not willingly.

None of her staff are unhappy to see her take an extended vacation. Being trained mental health professionals, they try to hide that fact with some degree of outward success. Liz doesn't call them on it. She just smiles back at them. 

All she wants is her share of the weekly profits, deposited on time. Her business manager can handle the rest.

***

The bright spring day starts well for Raymond Reddington. He's enjoying a cup of excellent coffee and a glittering blue view of the ocean. San Francisco is one of his favorite cities, at least when the fog recedes.

CIA Agent Helen Nash enters his hotel suite without knocking. Red gives her a pained smile.

"How charming you look this morning," he greets her. "Coffee? Or perhaps a pastry?" He gestures at the room service tray, silver on elegant white linen.

The slim blond woman eyes him without interest.

"The plane didn't land," she informs him.

Red shrugs, sets down his coffee, gives his tailored vest a little tug. He's gaining weight again. He needs to get out and about.

"You wanted me back here in this room by 10 pm, and so here I was. Not where I would normally be, on a Friday night."

"Where you should normally be is in prison," she responds. "If you have somehow deliberately diverted that plane...?"

Red smiles his most charming smile. "Now why would I do that to you, Helen?"

"Agent Nash, Reddington," she responds. "Do I need to change your morning breakfast order to tea and dry toast to make my point?"

"So harsh," he answers, coming to stand a little closer to her. A hint of aggression. That's promising.

She looks around the room. "You're a pig, Reddington. Like all criminals."

He follows her gaze. Newspapers on the coffee table, scotch glass and half-empty bottle from last night beside them. More newspapers, in various languages, folded in piles on the floor. Nothing particularly unusual.

"Do tell me how you really feel," he answers her, his voice sharpening.

She shakes her blond head. Not a strand of hair falls loose from her perfectly arranged hairstyle. He's often mused on how much hairspray she must use to attain that curving shell effect.

"I don't feel anything."

"Oh?" he raises one eyebrow at her, hoping for some sort of dialogue. Helen Nash has been guarding him for three months, and she's been as cold and negative as her predecessors. For a beautiful woman, she gives every impression of disinterest in him as a human being. It's not rejection. That would imply the possibility of interest.

Red picks up his coffee cup and takes a sip, awaiting her response. Trying to find the exact words for the CIA team he's working with at the moment. None of them are like Meera Malik, passionate about right and wrong, about justice, beneath her professional exterior.

They just don't seem to care. As if they're marking off time, not really interested in catching blacklisters. If Red does manage to get a new agent energized and excited, he or she is quickly replaced.

"Reddington, you're an old man with your life behind you. No matter how much of our time and money you waste with this immunity deal, you're just going to end up back in a cell. At the bottom of a deep dark hole. So why not get it over with?"

She looks at her watch.

"Be downstairs in ten minutes, or I'll haul you down in handcuffs."

Red blinks thoughtfully at her retreating back as he sips the rest of his coffee. This really isn't fun any more.

It's still sunny outside, but he's going to wear a wool hat today.


	6. Haifa

Haifa. A curving swathe of beach jeweled with lights at night.

Liz is beyond exhausted by the multiple flights and then the train journey. Traveling in coach is becoming more and more like being folded into an overhead compartment. She's a small, extremely limber woman and still the seats are unpleasant. If she had a hotel reservation she would probably collapse into bed and sleep for a night and a day.

Instead, she gives the taxi driver a slip of paper with an address and settles wearily into the back seat with her luggage.

"American?" he asks, rocketing off down the busy street. The evening sidewalks are crowded with young people, out to see and be seen.

"Yes," she confirms. She's traveling on her own passport.

"Birthright?" he asks eagerly.

She shakes her head. "No. Visiting old friends."

At least she hopes so.

"Ah," he subsides, seemingly disappointed. Drives a little more slowly.

The apartments near the beach where he finally deposits her are housed in a tall, narrow white tower.

Liz hefts her bags and gives her name at the security desk, shows her passport and receives a key with a sigh of relief.

She rented this place for a week over the Internet. It could have been a scam.

But the studio apartment is just as pictured, if a little smaller than the wide angle photographs made it appear, decorated in shades of white and cream. A thick glass bowl of brown and cream clam shells accents the small dining table.

She takes a quick shower, dresses in loose waffle knit gray pajamas, and unpacks, confirming that her cameras and spotting scope are undamaged in their foam-lined cases.

She was instructed to watch the beach. At a particular time, on a particular day, in a particular location.

They didn't say from how far away.

***

The descent from ordinary life to nameless expendable is always jarring. Red has experienced it more times with the CIA than he would ever admit to anyone. 

They hood him, strip off his expensive clothes, search him, then cuff him in some awkward position. Sometimes they leave him alone like that for hours.

A few of the agents seem to positively delight in locking him away, even if only for a few days. The thing is, Red never knows if this time is going to be three days, or three weeks.

Or even three months, the way they treated him that first time.

Oh, they claimed it was for his safety. And to gain a more thorough picture of the intelligence he could offer them. 

And for his health, when he fell ill with pneumonia and god knows what other infectious respiratory diseases they carefully pumped in and out of his cell as he lay naked and shivering on the bare steel floor.

At least this time he's clad in one of their ugly mustard-colored nylon jumpsuits. It doesn't provide much warmth, but even the semblance of dignity is welcome.

Agent Nash doesn't usually lock him away unless she has other, more pressing duties assigned. At least that's what she claims.

Who knows what she has planned for him this time?

Red sits on the metal bench, closes his eyes, and tries to imagine he feels the ocean beneath him, a ship moving through unfamiliar waters.

Nothing.

He could be on a ship, or in a bunker, or one of expensive specialized labs where they simulate various environments. Like Hollywood, with torture, on steroids.

All he can tell is that the air is recirculated. Not clean.

He has to remember that he's winning. 

That the decision he made was the right one.

Red finds it oddly easier to remember that when he's locked up. When he appears to outward eyes to have lost everything worth living for, he can turn that thought over in his head.

Apparently free, striding about in expensive hotel rooms and pontificating on how to catch blacklisters to the latest crop of CIA assigned to guard him, it's much harder. Working with him is apparently a punishment, at the CIA.

It's been more than a year. He should be able to declare the battle won. Cut his losses, take his wins, and disappear back into the underworld that has been his home for so long.

And yet he lingers. Tells himself every blacklister will be his last.

Maybe Agent Nash is right. He's an old man. He just needs to give up.


	7. Making Contact Again

Morning dawns bright and clear, the line of low puffy clouds far out on the ocean not cooling the air at all.

There's instant coffee and a microwave in the kitchenette. That's all she needs.

Liz dresses in her black bikini and applies sunblock lavishly, then positions herself behind the scope.

She was told 8:00, not am or pm. so she's watching carefully at 7:30 in the morning, camera hooked in place, auto-focusing.

The first thing she sees is the baby, a floppy pink plaid sunhat tied with ribbon beneath her chin. 

Liz triggers the camera, holding her breath.

The woman in the dark blue, modest, one piece swimsuit, spreading out the textured white cotton towels, is Samar.

The slim, darkly tanned man in green and blue plaid trunks, holding the baby, is Aram.

Liz shuts off the camera and deletes the images. Throws on a loose white caftan and sandals, grabs her beach bag and her keys, her sun hat and sunglasses.

If she runs all the way, she can catch them.

***

More than a week later, the phone rings twice, then stops ringing. Again and again.

Liz pulls out her burner cell, punches in the number of Ressler's brother.

There's a message on the voice mail. 

"Hey guys, I'm out of town. If this is my sister, leave me your number and I'll text you."

Ressler has no sister. 

Liz leaves the burner phone number on the recorder, and three minutes later, they are all crowded around the phone, trying not to shout over each other.

Ressler is fine. He's back from Syria for a while. He's in.

Aram lifts little Sarai up to the phone, and they all laugh as she burbles unintelligibly at Ressler.

They seat themselves at the long table with the phone between them, avoiding the tall chair at the head which belongs to Samar's uncle Yossi.

Liz doesn't want to know what Yossi does for a living. There are too many black late model Mercedes sedans pulling in and out of the family compound at all hours of the night and day.

"You can't count on finding him." Ressler sounds tired, but his words ring with certainty. "They drop him in holes regularly, and fish him back out when they need him."

"You've been keeping tabs on him?" Samar asks, leaning towards the phone. "Why?"

"Haven't you?" he retorts.

Liz looks at Samar, then at Aram. He winces. Bounces Sarai on his lap.

"Am I the only one who didn't know something was very wrong about this deal between Reddington and the CIA?" she asks, looking across the table.

"We thought you knew," Aram begins.

"Hell, some of the higher-ups at the bureau thought you engineered it," Ressler breaks in.

Liz shakes her head.

"Dembe won't tell me why Red reached out to them," she admits.

Samar makes a face.

"Someone put pressure on him," she responds. "I don't know who, or why, but that's what my sources say. He took a phone call at a pay phone, went absolutely white, then disappeared."

"What did they say to him?" Liz asks. She never imagined the decision being anything but his free choice.

Samar shrugs, reaches over to take Sarai into her arms. Aram runs his fingers through his waves of dark hair, grown out almost to his shoulders.

"No audio. And Reddington doesn't tolerate betrayal. We got nothing from his people."

"The CIA's not going to tell us." Ressler again, sounding irritated. "I can call in a few favors, maybe it's old news by now."

Old news. 

Liz stares at the phone. Willing herself not to strike it, break it.

A whole year. Where is Red and what could possibly have led him to take such a drastic step?

"Agreed, then?" she says. "We find him, find out why he did this? Take him back, if that's at all possible?"

Aram and Samar nod slowly.

"Agreed," says Ressler.

Liz can't believe the relief flooding through her. She's not alone anymore. Perhaps she never was.

"Dembe will help us, once we have a plan," she goes on. "Here's how I think we should proceed."


	8. Insurance

Red wakes slowly, his head spinning. He rolls to his side, barely managing to get his stubbled face clear of the steel bench before he vomits onto the concrete floor of the cell.

Anesthesia. He's reacting poorly to it once again.

Spitting to try and clear the foul taste from his mouth, Red feels for the lump of the chip in his neck. No change.

He's still in the mustard colored jumpsuit, but it's unsnapped to his waist.

A bandage just below his rib cage on his right side provides the answer. Stitches. Just a small incision.

His head is pounding. His chest and his lungs ache. Red is suddenly very afraid.

That incision. They've put something in his chest.

Agent Nash threatened him with this once, when he was late for a rendezvous due to the difficulty of choosing the perfect fabrics for his new summer suits.

A CIA-designed final exit, a capsule filled with a weaponized poison embedded beside his heart. Risky, because sometimes the trigger malfunctions and accidentally kills the subject, along with anyone in close proximity to the body. Red had assumed he was too valuable.

He has delayed his escape for too long. They can drop him in his tracks with a push of a button now.

He''ll never be free again. No wonder Agent Nash looked so sour. Her life is at risk now, too.

He vomits again, his cheek pressed to the cold metal of the bench.

At least he knows now how he's going to die, Red thinks with black humor. He's been wondering about that for decades.

***

Liz returns to Papillion via the state park where she set up her tent in the hike-in camping field. Her sleeping bag is damp and the tent is muddy and plastered with leaves.

Perfect.

She dumps the spoiled food from the ice chest into the dumpster at the trail head and loads up her car.

Back at the office, she announces to her staff that her next vacation will include a beach. And no more rain.

Her yard looks wonderful. She compliments the garden service and engages them on a weekly basis. Her home just looks bland.

Over the course of the next few weeks she adds clients back into her schedule, and starts advertising aggressively. She needs more income, and soon.

"Ok Aram, what next?" she asks, holding the secure satellite phone between her shoulder and her ear as she works to configure the software on her new laptop.

"You need to create a character, log in to the game, and then add me as a friend."

It was Aram who came up with this new way to communicate. They will talk in a simple code while they play an online game together. Save the satellite phones for when they are really needed.

Liz doesn't know what Samar told her uncle Yossi to obtain the phones. She doesn't want to know. It's mind-blowing enough to have learned that Samar's maternal grandfather is a Russian commander with the Northern Fleet.

Ressler wasn't very happy about that news. He's going to be back in the field again soon, so he won't be reachable by phone, but he's assured them that playing an online game is an ordinary diversion.

An old friend has agreed to access Red's closed FBI file.

"I have to choose my hair color?" Liz asks, staring at the attenuated female figure on the screen.

"You get to choose a whole bunch of features on your character for free now, so choose carefully. It's expensive to change later," Aram advises her.

Liz scrolls down the list. Why do people care about these minute details? she wonders to herself.

She chooses waist length red hair for her character, and a long crimson dress. She doesn't bother to examine her reasons too closely.

****

Over the past two months, at her request, Dembe has searched every safe house and strong box he can reach, to no avail. If Red wanted to leave him a message, he hasn't done so.

Ressler's friend found little more in Red's FBI file than what they already knew. That Red approached the CIA and brokered the deal. However, the groundwork appeared to have been laid in advance, since they reached agreement almost immediately.

Liz remembers how Red went back and forth with the FBI for weeks, making tiny changes to the wording of his immunity deal. She asks Ressler if he can obtain a copy of the agreement.

But Samar is the one who locates it via a Mossad source.

She reads portion of it aloud through the gaming interface as their characters wander together across a field, picking plants.

Liz stares numbly at the blue and green foliage on her screen as the words sink in.

Even accounting for agency format differences, this is nothing like his previous immunity deal. Red signed away any and all rights, and in exchange for what?

Identifying the criminals on his blacklist in the order he chose. Nothing more.

"Liz, you knew him the best of all of us," types Aram into the silence that follows the reading. They switch between typing and their mikes.

"No, don't pick those flowers," puts in Samar. "You won't be able to use them for another ten levels."

"Oh, OK, thanks," Liz types back slowly.

"She could sell them," says Ressler. He has the richest character already. Liz is pretty sure he plays this game more often than the occasions they meet online.

"Maybe someone offered him something he wanted?" she suggests.

Dembe still won't tell her what he knows. But he's willing to help them find Red.

"The only way he would sign this is if someone had him over a barrel," asserts Ressler.

There's another silence.

"Do you think we could put Mr. Reddington at risk, by looking for him?" asks Aram, a little nervously.

"Not if we're careful," says Liz at last. "Let's concentrate on the tracking chip. How many of them are there in use, anyway?"

"Hundreds," returns Samar at once. "They're expensive, but reusable."

"So we need an older chip, with the codes rotated around the time he left," says Aram.

"Don't they change those codes regularly?" asks Liz.

"No," says Aram, "He had the one we first programmed up until they took him."

"If we knew that code, we could at least pinpoint where he was. Where the new code first logged in."

"It wasn't in his file," says Ressler, just as Aram's voice rises in excitement.

"I sill have it in my phone."

"Your phone?" asks Liz.

"My old phone," responds Aram, typing again. "I sometimes checked on him away from work."

"You are a wonderful man," types Samar. Her character does a little happy dance on the screen.

Now all they need is a Darpa-encrypted laptop. Liz will call Dembe in the morning.


	9. Location

The final location of the chip is a blacksite in Utah. 

Only one chip code appears linked to that location. The new chip code was there again, less than a week ago.

If it's the right chip, they've found Red. Or at least, where he's been.

"Are you sure you don't want me to go?" Ressler asks her, once Aram gives her the location, a hotel in downtown Phoenix. 

He's back in Syria again. The offer is sweet, but impractical.

Liz flies into Tucson, changes out of her customary black leggings and top in a cheap hotel room, and rents a full-size car under an alias.

She has brown contact lenses, heavy make-up, and a long, curly blond wig. The animal print outfits in her suitcase are new, expensive, and very revealing. The satellite phone is tucked into her purse.

Arizona is hot and dry and covered with cacti. The drive is dull but uneventful.

Liz valets the car and checks into the high-rise hotel that matches the tracker. As she scans the lobby while she waits for the elevator, she notices that the bar has a placard announcing live jazz.

If Red is here, there's a good chance she'll find him there this evening, drinking.

***

"I'll just go sit in the car, shall I?" asks Red, standing beside Agent Helen Nash as the CIA operatives slowly creep towards the low, beige complex of buildings that house the latest blacklister.

It's late afternoon, and the sun slants fiercely across the arid landscape.

She shakes her head.

"You'll wait right here until we're certain we have everyone in custody."

His wrists are handcuffed behind him, so he can't wipe the beads of sweat forming on his forehead beneath the brim of his wool hat and rolling down his face.

His shirt is soaked through beneath his vest and suit jacket. He hasn't had any water since their lunch at a greasy diner up the road.

Agent Nash is wearing a loose white linen suit and a broad brimmed straw hat. She's drinking cold spring water from a tall plastic bottle. She hasn't offered him any.

"If I pass out from the heat, you'll wish you sent me to the car," he says encouragingly. "May I at least have some water?"

She gives him a critical stare, then unscrews the cap.

Red opens his mouth, waits patiently for a drink.

She splashes water in his face, laughs as he tries to lick the drops rolling down his face.

"There you go, Reddington," she laughs as she splashes him again and again. When she stops, Red stares down at the dark puddle by his feet as the water sinks into the parched soil.

His shoes are soaked through, but he barely managed to swallow a mouthful of water.

If he removes or shields the tracking chip, they'll trigger the poison. Right now he's so physically miserable he wishes he could tear the chip out of his neck.

At least she'll have to remove the handcuffs when he returns to the hotel.

Maybe he'll get really lucky, and Agent Nash will turn him over to some local agent for a few hours.

"Thank you, Helen," he tells her. "That was most refreshing."

She turns her head and glares at him.

"One more word, Reddington, and I'll toss you right onto your ass on that cactus."

Red looks over at the cactus and winces.

She would, too. 

***

Liz is sitting in the bar when two men enter the lobby. One is a young, crew cut Hispanic man in a suit that screams FBI.

The other is a very red-faced, bedraggled Raymond Reddington.

"Watch my drink, honey. I"ll be right back," she drawls to the bartender, then saunters at high speed across the lobby on her three inch platform heels.

"Ray-mond, how are you, sugar?" she exclaims.

The FBI agent stands watching her approach with an expression of dread.

"Excuse me, ma'am?" 

Liz steps right up into his body space as Red swiftly steps behind him to prevent any retreat, and pats his shoulders, palms his badge. Still so quick on the uptake.

"Well, now that's rather insulting, calling me ma'am as if I'm some old lady?" she says to the agent. "Ray-mond, you need to buy me a drink to apologize."

She gives the agent a disapproving look.

"Your associates didn't used to be so ..." Liz tips her head to one side and brushes a long blond curl away from her face. 

"Uncouth?" responds Red, blinking at her without moving towards the bar.

"Ma'am, you need to step away .." the agent breaks off in mid-sentence as he feels for his badge and fails to locate it.

"Why don't I buy this young woman a drink and wait for you in the bar?" suggests Red smoothly.

The agent looks from Red to Liz. She shifts from one foot to the other, drawing attention to her incredibly short tiger print skirt, which clashes horribly with her bright green heels and her sleeveless leopard print top.

"Spoken like a true gentleman," Liz drawls.

"Uh," says the agent, looking helpless.

Liz bats her long, heavily mascaraed fake eyelashes at him.

"Come along," says Red, at last moving off in the direction of the bar.

"What are you doing here, Lizzie?" he asks her in a harsh whisper as soon as they are out of earshot.

Liz leads him to her seat at the end of the bar. He reaches over for her untouched glass of water, ignoring her cocktail, and drinks it all.

He looks around the room.

"Where's your back-up?" he asks her bluntly.

Liz hops on her stool and pats the stool next to him, keeping her gestures exaggerated.

"Let's catch up," she says.

He gives her a poisonous glare, but sits and gestures at the barman.

"Your best scotch. Bring the bottle."

"Two glasses, sugar," adds Liz.

She can't help staring as Red sets his sweat-stained hat on the bar, then arranges his hands in his lap.

His wrists are scored by deep bruises, as if he's been handcuffed too tightly for hours. His face is sunburned and filthy, and he smells of sweat, not cologne.

Liz leans forward and sniffs in that heady male odor. Continuing to exaggerate her gestures for anyone watching.

"Yes, it's disgustingly hot here," Red comments in a disagreeable tone, pouring them both shots and downing his at once.

She shakes her head. She's not disgusted at all; the sight of him, even in this condition, sets her nerves alight. No time for that. Too many cameras.

"You're going to tell me why you left the task force," she says firmly. "Quickly, before that young idiot returns."

Red shrugs, takes another drink.

"It's done, Lizzie. Why do you even care?"

"Tell me, or I swear to god I'll ask your handler myself."

He rolls his eyes at her.

"Please, Red," she begs. "We know something's wrong. Let me help. Please."

He shakes his head, takes another large swallow of scotch. His head and face glisten with sweat, his eyes going a little bleary.

"I'll tell you. But there's nothing you or anyone else can do."

***

Dembe turns heads when he strolls into the coffee house in suburban Tucson.

He's casually dressed for the weather in khaki shorts and a loose shirt. The shirt proclaims him to be the winner of a recent mixed martial arts bout that was widely televised.

"You look wonderful!" Liz exclaims, pulling him to her in a warm hug before seating herself again.

"We couldn't do this online?" he asks her doubtfully.

The small coffee house is crowded with locals. It's as safe as any place.

Liz shakes her head.

"I found him, and I found out why he did it." She pins Dembe with her best version of Red's glare. "How could you let him?"

Dembe shrugs, stirs away the pattern in the foam of his cappuccino.

"The cabal told him to choose. Either leave, or they would arrange an accident for Cooper and the rest of you."

"But why the CIA? Why not just disappear?"

Dembe meets her gaze with another shrug.

"Raymond said you would believe in the transfer."

"Me?" she asks him over the rim of her latte. "Or all of us?"


	10. New Choices

It's very late when Liz meets Samar online. Their characters wander through a forest populated by rainbow hued deer and tiny singing birds.

"I wondered if it was something like that," says Samar, after she confesses.

Liz sighs with relief, sitting cross-legged in front of her laptop on her neatly made bed back in Papillion. No condemnation, just curiosity.

"So you want him back .. for yourself?"

Liz nods. Types the words. Stares at them before she hits the Enter key.

"Yes. I love him."

She doesn't want to feel anything for him. Red should have remained an asset, nothing more. But that one night was enough.

His sad, sad eyes.

In Phoenix, he looked at once heavier than she's ever seen him, and yet so hungry. The way he gulped down that scotch, as if he seldom had the opportunity to drink. An unhealthy gray tinge to his skin.

"You need to tell Don."

Ressler. How will he handle this?

She was with him when he lost Audrey. He has the capacity to understand how she feels.

Their characters emerge from the wood into bright sunlight. They're standing on a cliff, high above a gleaming silver sea that stretches to the horizon.

"I'll tell him next weekend," she promises. She doesn't have to ask about Aram. He's probably reading the screen over Samar's shoulder.

"Kiss the baby for me," she types. They don't use their real names online.

Liz closes the laptop, stares down at it. Sarai is so beautiful. Will she ever have a child?

She works with the courts as a counselor. She could easily adopt.

But what she wants, more than a child, more than anything else in this world, is Raymond Reddington. Alive and free.

***

Liz smiles and welcomes her latest client into her office. The tall, slim man with the bright hazel eyes and the prosthetic leg has war stories to tell. Graphic war stories that no one in his large, loving family can bear to hear.

Liz listens and nods, prompts him when he falters.

She knows about death, and killing, and the accusing faces that swim up from the depths of defenseless sleep. 

About feeling unworthy, too twisted and dangerous to fit back into normal society.

This is good, honorable work. It just isn't enough for her.

She clears her available accounts once more, books a round-trip ticket for Las Vegas.

Her employees whisper about her gambling problem. But they all still get paid every month. None of them care enough about Liz personally to confront her.

***

Dembe welcomes her into the penthouse suite with a hug.

"So this is how the other half lives," Ressler greets her from across the room, gesturing with his beer.

"Did Aram get out of his conference session, yet?" Liz asks, dropping her jacket and purse on a chair and reaching out for Sarai, who squirms in response to her kiss.

There's a major white hat convention going on downstairs. 

Samar laughs.

"I'll probably have to go down and drag him out," she responds.

This is their last meeting before they set the plan in motion.

There are maps spread out on the table in the dining room off the suite's large living room, cases of gear and weapons scattered everywhere.

Red's jet is fueled and waiting.

The rumored sale of a stolen Kinzhal system to Afghan terrorists is enough to propel Red and his handler into the Kola Bay region. Not alone, of course.

There's a reason Dembe has procured all this firepower.

"I hate Severomorsk," grumbles Samar, changing Sarai's diaper on a changing pad on the butter yellow couch.

Liz lays her hand on her friend's shoulder.

"Thank you," she says sincerely. Getting in touch with her grandfather, the naval commander, on his submarine meant Samar had to talk with her mother about their plan.

Still active Mossad, she at first refused to participate, and then, after a private conversation with Dembe, instead demanded to come with them.

Liz doesn't know what he promised on Red's behalf that could have reconciled her to putting her only grandchild at risk. 

The CIA, with Red in tow, will require days to reach the town, by plane and then by train.

Dembe is taking them in the jet over the pole, through a carefully arranged, precisely timed radar gap. This will be Sarai's first visit to Russia. She's the first great-grandchild.

Liz hasn't been able to contact Red to let him know what they have planned. The CIA have been keeping him on the move. Or down in one of those holes.


	11. Russia

Red stares out the window of the slowly chugging train at the snow. He's beyond weary, his head pounding after days of unrelenting travel. He leans his forehead against the cold glass, twisting his shoulders in an effort to relieve the spasms from being handcuffed for far too long.

He's concluded that Helen Nash is a sadist. Not a playful sadist.

The other agents uncuff him to stretch, lead him regularly to the restroom. Allow him a little privacy, especially given his upset stomach.

She always orders him the spiciest, greasiest food on the menu.

Red can't help but hope that this latest blacklister was revealed as a result of some plot by Dembe or Liz. It doesn't make much sense to him, this disguised foray deep into northern Russia. 

He has contacts here. But if he disappears, they will just die of the poison with him.

Red can't think of anyone he wants dead that badly. His own personal doomsday weapon. Pondering how and when to use it occupies more of his mind than he suspects is healthy.

Agent Nash tells him the poison causes a painful, lingering death. She seems to enjoy regaling him with the details. Maybe he'll pick her, after all.

He looks up as the compartment door slides open.

"Still here, Reddington?" she laughs, bundled warmly in a long fur jacket and matching hat. His overcoat is stowed in the rack above him, leaving him shivering in the cold. He doesn't even bother to ask. She would be more likely to take away his shoes or his jacket.

"Bend forward," she orders him, then gives his handcuffs a tug when he complies. Pain shoots through him at the unaccustomed movement.

"Just sit there like a good little criminal and behave," she sneers, pulling a flask from her pocket and taking a slug as he watches. Vodka. How wonderful that would taste right now.

"You want this, don't you?" she says, holding the flask toward him, wavering a little on her high, fur trimmed boots.

He opens his mouth, closes it on the taste of bitter frustration as she sloshes vodka onto the floor of the car.

"Oops!" she laughs. "Too bad for you." 

She takes another drink, then wanders away, not without locking the compartment door behind her.

Red looks down at the filthy floor, the little trickle of clear fluid spreading and running towards the wall as the train starts to accelerate.

Is it worth trying to get down on his knees on the floor to lick it up? He doesn't even know.

****

Liz licks her chapped lips nervously as she prepares to step onto the deck of the Delfin-class sub.

Aram is already on board, with Sarai in a front carrier.

He waves down at her.

Dembe and Ressler are still busy locking down the members of the CIA team they diverted to the battle cruiser. No deaths, to their credit.

It's a cold, blustery dawn, and Red and his handler, a statuesque woman named Helen Nash, should be joining them soon.

Liz can't help but wonder about their relationship. Red was unusually silent on the subject of Agent Nash, when she ventured a question in Phoenix.

Two figures approach, a tall blond woman clad head to toe in real fur, and Red in a dark suit with a long gray scarf at his throat, followed closely by Samar, well-bundled against the chill, and her grandfather, a short, stout man in uniform.

"We discuss this only once we are at sea," she hears him say in Russian, shaking one finger at the blond.

Liz ducks down inside the submarine and smiles at the youthful crew, ignoring their comments. She'll let them know her Russian is excellent only once the operation is over.

She follows Aram down a narrow hall, closes them into the commander's quarters to wait.

They don't know what communication options Agent Helen Nash has available to her. They can't risk her triggering the poison.

The commander knows only that they are engaged in a classified operation to stop a theft. He's willing to play along.

The sub heads ponderously for the open sea.

Liz closes her eyes and tries to remain calm.

The signal to dive is her signal.

Aram gives her a thumbs up. Sarai burbles from her carrier.

Liz bursts into the briefing room brandishing a pistol and strikes Agent Nash hard across the face.

"Traitor," she screams, then strikes the shocked agent again, knocking her unconscious to the deck.

The commander stares up at her, confused.

"Go, go!" yells Samar.

Liz tucks the weapon into her pocket and grabs Red by the hand.

"Come with me, now," she orders him.

"Lizzie, what are you doing?" he asks her in a desperate voice.

"No time," she answers him, as they reach the correct hatch.

"Lizzie, if she doesn't report in soon..."

Red's eyes are wide and fearful.

Liz grabs him by the shoulders and shakes him. Wills him to silence.

"We have a surgical team standing by," she says. "Between the sound dampers and the depth, you should be fine."

He stares at her as if trying to understand what she's saying. They're not deep enough yet. This could still go so horribly wrong.

She leans in, presses a quick kiss to his unresisting lips. Then she pushes Red, seemingly stunned, into the room and shuts the hatch, locking him inside.

Each compartment is pressurized separately. If the signal finds him before they reach a safe depth to shield them, he'll die alone.

This was the best plan they could come up with, after so many conversations.

It was her call. Her responsibility.

Liz leans against the hatch and shivers. Russia is so cold.

If she's killed the man she loves, she'll never be warm again.


	12. Results

Back in the briefing room, Agent Nash finally regains consciousness. The commander is staring down at her with worry on his face.

"Where's Reddington?" she snarls.

"He's in the bathroom," begins Samar.

The blond woman scrambles to her feet and stares around the room.

"We can't dive," she cries out. "We just can't."

Liz, who has been leaning against the wall beside the door, steps forward.

"Why not, Agent Nash?" she asks, searching the other woman's face. Does this woman have any sympathy for Red? Surely she must, having worked with him for so long.

The woman's face whitens.

"You. You're Elizabeth Keen," she blurts out.

Liz frowns.

"How do you know my name?" she asks.

Helen Nash stares around the room, her lips pursed angrily.

"I have nothing more to say," she says, folding her arms across her chest. "At least if I die, you die with me."

***

They've been two hours at depth when the commander allows her to unseal the hatch.

Red is sitting on the floor in his shirtsleeves, his head leaned back against his folded jacket as if he's dozing. His eyes snap open as she enters the room.

Liz smiles down at him a little tremulously.

"The surgeon is here," she tells him. "They're going to remove the chip and the poison, with the hatch closed. Just to be on the safe side."

A small plump woman with jet black hair pokes her head into the room. She's dressed in surgical scrubs with a mask hanging loose on her chest.

"You, out," she tells Liz.

"You, take off your shirt," she tells Red.

He gives a rueful little laugh.

Liz hears him beginning to regale the surgeon with a long and convoluted story in Russian while undressing as she leaves the room.

***

Red awakens in a strange bed. He's lying in a narrow bunk. On a submarine.

There's a fresh bandage on his neck, and another, larger one, on his abdomen.

He's completely naked beneath the covers. He really needs to speak with Liz about whether that was strictly necessary.

Elizabeth Keen. His Lizzie. She came for him, even after the way they parted.

And Samar. How did she convince that wily ex-Mossad assassin to lend herself to this scheme?

Red pulls the covers up to his chin as the door to the tiny room opens.

It's Aram, curiously enough, wearing an empty baby sling.

Red blinks at him. Perhaps this is all a hallucination. The CIA tried drug assisted interrogation on him twice, but Red has too much experience with recreationals for it to be effective.

His feet are cold. Red wiggles his toes experimentally.

"Uh, Mr. Reddington? Do you need any help getting dressed?"

Red follows his gaze to the neatly folded pile of his clothes on the floor.

"Am I getting dressed?" he asks Aram.

Aram nods solemnly.

"We need to get back to the jet. Agent Ressler only has fourteen hours to get back to Syria."

Now Red knows he's hallucinating.

Well, he can certainly dress himself.

"I'll be fine, but thank you, Aram," he says gently.

Aram's nervous smile widens.

"You're so welcome," he says in a proud tone, and closes the door, leaving Red alone with his clothing. And his increasingly puzzled thoughts.


	13. Saying Goodbye

The young Russian sailors who lead him through the narrow metal corridors stop outside the briefing room.

Red hesitates. He doesn't want to see Agent Nash in a hallucination.

"Red?" Lizzie opens the door, holds out her hand to him. "Come on in, we're just saying goodbye."

He takes her hand and attempts to assimilate the sight of the Russian commander holding and kissing an infant, while Samar and Aram look on with their arms intertwined.

He has to ask.

"What happened to Agent Helen Nash?" he asks Liz in a whisper.

Samar looks over.

"She'll be reunited with her team back at the port."

"I'm the villain - I got to hit her. Twice," reports Liz with satisfaction.

"Very good," responds Red, a little helplessly. She squeezes his fingers.

"Dembe's waiting for you on the jet," she informs him.

This is too visually consistent to be a hallucination. How did he warrant this extraordinary rescue?

***

After a swift transfer by Zodiac from the sub to the small airfield, Liz settles herself in her seat on the jet, sipping wine and watching Dembe talking with Red. The big man keeps reaching out, touching Red's arm or shoulder as if to make a point.

Aram is rocking Sarai to sleep, and Samar is busily texting photos of the visit to her mother.

Ressler settles into the seat beside her, visibly still worked up from the raid.

"I need to sleep, but I'm never gonna manage it," he complains.

Red looks back over his shoulder, points upwards.

"Pills in the cabinet," he says briefly.

Ressler reaches up, inspects the collection of more than 30 different pill bottles. Settles on an over the counter sleep aid.

Liz gives Ressler a smile, and tucks his blanket up under his chin.

"Sleep well," she says softly.

Red is watching her. She smiles back at him in reassurance, then gets to her feet and stretches.

He's starting to look a little more like himself. She wants him calm and confident when she tells him that Agent Nash recognized her.

That wasn't part of the plan.

***

Liz planned to tell him sooner, but exhaustion caught up with her while Red was still talking with Dembe.

She wakes to say good-bye to her friends in Istanbul.

Then she and Red are alone.

"Where to, next?" he asks her. He hasn't slept much, as evidenced by the deep circles beneath his red-rimmed eyes, but he looks so alive as he drops to sit in the seat beside her. 

Liz shrugs.

"Perhaps you have a suggestion? Since I can't go back to Nebraska."

"Why not?"

Liz shakes her head.

"Somehow, your Agent Nash recognized me. Drawing you out into Russia, besides easy access to the sub, meant local CIA who wouldn't recognize us."

Red colors faintly.

"That would be my fault, I'm afraid."

"Why?" asks Liz.

"Your photo was in my wallet."

Liz shakes her head again. So many things could have tipped the balance and caused their plans to falter or fail. A sentimental Reddington was nowhere in any of their contingency planning.

"Why, Lizzie?" he asks her quietly. He's still wearing his suit from the sub, but his wrinkled collar is open and he's removed his shoes. There's a hole in the toe of one dress sock.

"You know," she tells him, dropping her eyes to her reddened scar. Stilling the movement of her moving fingers, rubbing, rubbing.

"I didn't get a chance to tell you ..." he begins. Stops abruptly. "I might not have said anything..." Another pause.

She stares down at her lap. The silence lengthens.

"You did it to save us." She raises her eyes to meet his weary gaze.

He shrugs.

"Nothing so noble. I did it because I couldn't live with your death."

"And Dembe disagreed?"

Red glances forward as if expecting to see Dembe still sitting there.

"He said I should tell you," he confirms, his mouth twisting sideways. 

"I wouldn't have let you do it," Liz responds. 

Red scratches the back of his head. 

"And you would be ... dead. All of you." 

She shakes her head. "You can't know that."

Another silence. It seems they've come to the end of the story.

"Was that night just good-bye? For you?"

It's humiliating, but she has to ask. Just to be sure.

To her shock, Red buries his face in his hands for a moment. She's never seen him so at a loss for words.

Cautiously, she sets her hand on his shoulder. Feels the warmth of his skin through the thin fabric. His big body always runs so warm. Liz can't forget the way she reached for him again and again in the course of that night, his sleepy response always to pull her closer. Always welcoming.


	14. Just One More Lie

Red stares into darkness, covering his face. As if he can somehow hide from her question.

Just one lie, that Liz means nothing to him, and she'll be free. Whatever danger Helen Nash presents, he can find some way to deal with that. Red has so many excellent choices for his next identity.

Liz built a peaceful, happy life without the FBI. He had her watched in Nebraska, once the CIA released him after those first three horrible months. But the cabal will never stop hunting him. 

Her hand rests so lightly on his shoulder. If only he can be sure that she's safer apart from him, rather than at his side. Then he can force himself to tell that lie.

"Red, please. You promised never to lie to me."

A wave of dread washes through him. Her hand caresses the back of his head, very gently. The tender way she touched him that night.

Red looks over, sees her eyes filling with tears. Her expression making it clear she's trying so hard to be brave. He clasps his hands tightly in his lap to avoid reaching for her.

"No. It wasn't just ..." His voice goes hoarse. Red can't go on. He's endured so much, and yet the sight of her tears spilling soundlessly down her cheeks unmans him.

"Let me come with you. Please."

Liz bends her head, lays her forehead to his.

"Please, Red. All I want is you."

She's begging him. She gave him her body and her heart, and he abandoned her for more than a year without apology or explanation, and now she's begging him? 

"Please."

She reaches over, takes his clasped hands, bends her head and kisses his fingers, his knuckles, the curve of his thumbs.

"Please. Red, please," she whispers between suppliant kisses. Her tears falling on his hands, on his wrists.

"Yes," he whispers finally. "Yes."

He may be damning them both. But he can't tell her no.

***

Chameleon.

He's another man once he finally decides. Chooses her, as she chose him that very first night. Set every part of her being in his deceptively deadly hands.

Matching rings, matching luggage. 

British passports.

Reservations for a round the world honeymoon cruise, somehow booked months in advance.

"You bought yourself a title?" she whispers, as they wait to board the small, exclusive vessel in Copenhagen. 

He smiles a little sardonically at her, his gaze still sweeping the waiting passengers, the uniformed staff, in that familiar wary way.

"Sir Richard and Lady Beth do go well together, don't they?" he murmurs. "And we'll be sitting at the captain's table."

He tips his hat as they make their way up the gangplank, arm in arm. 

Just another rich, happy couple enjoying their honeymoon.


End file.
